Scraper

ABSTRACT

An earthmoving scraper having a front drive unit and a rear drive unit and a scraper bowl located therebetween. Both the front and rear drive units are steerable about vertical axes and the scraper bowl is open at opposite ends so that the scraper can be driven in either direction for loading the bowl. An ejector system is provided which serves to discharge material out of the bowl by gravity.

United States atent Mazzarins 1 June 20, 1972 [54] SCRAPER 3,183,6095/1965 Le Toumeau ..37 127 3,346,975 10/1967 La Joye ..37 127 ux [72]Invenmr' Jan's MmmnsMacedmaohm 3,521,388 7 1970 Simmons ..37/129 [73]Assignee: General Motors Corporation, Detroit, 3,584,405 6/1971Mazzarins ....37/ 129 Mich. 3,564,737 2/1971 Simmons et al ..37 129 22Filed: Nov. 18, 1970 21 Appl. No.2 90,624

[52] US. Cl ..37/l27, 214/500 [51] Int. Cl ..E02f 5/00, E02f 3/62 [58]Fieldot'Search ..37/124, 126 R, 126 A, 126 AA,

37/126 AB, 126 AC, 126 AD, 126 AE, 127, 128, 129,129 G, 129 H, 133;214/500 Johnson 37/l26 AC Primary Examiner-Robert E. Pulfrey AssistantExaminer-Eugene H. Eickholt Attorney.l. L. Carpenter and E. J. Biskup [57] ABSTRACT An earthmoving scraper having a front drive unit and a reardrive unit and a scraper bowl located therebetween. Both the front andrear drive units are steerable about vertical axes and the scraper bowlis open at opposite ends so that the scraper can be driven in eitherdirection for loading the bowl. An ejector system is provided whichserves to discharge material out of the bowl by gravity.

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I N VEN TOR.

ATTORNEY I INVESTOR D Jzzzz's J/{azzam'm ATTO RNEY SCRAPER Presentscrapers utilized by the earthmoving industry usually consist of atractor connected through a pull yoke arrangement to a trailing scraperbowl. The tractor can be of the two-axle type or the more commonsingle-axle overhung type, in which case the tractor as a unit ispivotable about a vertical axis for steering purposes. With regard tothe latter form of scraper, it has been determined that the length ofthe load-carrying portion of the bowl is relatively small when comparedwith the wheel base of the scraper. In other words, the area locatedbetween the front and rear wheels of the scraper is devoted primarily tostructural support components designed in a manner which eliminatesadequate space for materialretaining purposes. In some scrapers, it hasbeen found that as little as 39 percent of the wheel base is utilizedfor retaining material. Other scrapers, mainly those having two-axletype tractors, may devote a greater percentage of the wheel base to loadcapacity of the scraper, however, this percentage seldom, if ever,exceeds 50 percent.

Apart from the small percentage of wheel base devoted to load-retainingcapacity, present-day scrapers also suffer from the deficiency ofrequiring a relatively large area in order to made a complete turn. Asshould be apparent, increased productivity of the scraper is determinedto a great extent by how quickly the scraper can be maneuvered into itsdigging position and also the speed at which it can be completelyloaded. Merely lengthening the bowls of the present form of scraperswill not increase their productivity because, beyond a certain bowllength, the loading ability of a scraper diminishes as the bowl lengthincreases. This is due to the fact that the dirt already in the bowlmust be pushed toward the rear of the bowl prior to new materialentering the bowl. Thus, increased resistance to continued loading ofthe bowl is encountered.

The present invention is directed to a scraper which is intended toalleviate many of the problems mentioned above. More specifically, thepresent invention contemplates a scraper in which approximately 65percent of the wheel base is devoted to the load-retaining capacity andin which increased efficiency is realized during a loading ortransporting operation. In the preferred form, the scraper according tothis invention includes a bowl that is open at both ends and issupported between a pair of steerable drive units, each of which isconnected to the bowl by a king pin that provides for pivotal movementabout a vertical steer axis. Each open end of the bowl supports apivoted apron which is power-operated for opening or closing the mouthof the bowl so as to facilitate a digging operation and to serve as aretaining wall when a loaded bowl is being transported to a dumpingarea. In addition, both the front end and rear end of the bowl have ascraper blade so that loading of the scraper can occur when it is drivenin one direction or in a direction opposite thereto. The bowl issupported at the forward and rearward ends through a parallelogramlinkage which permits the cutting blade at either end to be lowered intoa dig position for cutting material and causing it to flow into the bowlwhile ejection of the material is provided by a pair of axially alignedplate sections which normally serve as a horizontal floor for materialwithin the bowl. In this regard, the adjacent ends of the plate sectionsare connected to each other through a hinge arrangement which in turn ispivotally connected to a vertically oriented power cylinder supported bythe bowl. Thus by contracting the power cylinder, the hinge arrangementtogether with the adjacent ends of the plate sections are raised in avertical direction so as to cause the free ends of the plate sections tomove rearwardly to drop the material out of the bowl.

The objects of the present invention are to provide a scraper having abowl that can be loaded when the scraper is driven forwardly orrearwardly and includes an ejection system which causes the material tobe dropped from the bowl by gravity; to provide a scraper having a bowlthat is supported between a pair of drive units, each of which issteerable about a vertical axis and is connected to the bowl by aparallelogram linkage; to provide an ejection system for a scraper bowlcapable of being loaded from either end thereof that serves as ahorizontal floor for supporting material within the bowl and is dividedinto hinged sections which can be raised with a bowl dividing wall so asto cause the material to drop by gravity out of the bowl; and to providea scraper having a material-retaining bowl of a length which is greaterthan 55 percent of the wheel base of the scraper.

Other objects and advantages of the present invention will be apparentfrom the following detailed description when taken with the drawings inwhich:

FIG. 1 is a side elevation view showing a scraper made in accordancewith the invention;

FIG. 2 is a plan view of the scraper shown in FIG. 1;

FIG. 3 is a view similar to FIG. 1 but shows the ejection system beingoperated for discharging a load from the bowl; and

4 is a schematic view showing the path that the scraper of FIGS. 1 and 3would be driven when making a complete turn.

Referring now to the drawings and more particularly FIGS. 1 and 2thereof, an earthmoving scraper 10 made according to the invention isshown comprising a from frame or drive unit 12 and a rear frame or driveunit 14 which are respectively supported by rigid transverse axles l6and 18, the opposite ends of which rotatably support rubber tires 20.Located between the drive units 12 and 14 is a scraper bowl 22, theopposite ends of which are connected to the drive units by draftassemblies 24 and 26. The draft assembly 24 supports an operators cab 28which normally faces in the forward direction and includes a steeringwheel 30, the rotation of which serves to provide steering movement tothe drive units 12 and 14 in a manner to be described hereinafter.

Each of the drive units 12 and 14 includes an engine 32 connectedthrough a suitable shaft 34 to a transmission and gear box assembly 36which supplies drive through a drive shaft 38 to the associated axle.Thus, the scraper 10 is an all-wheel drive vehicle with suitable engineand transmission controls being located within the operators cab in aconventional manner.

The scraper bowl 22 comprises the usual laterally spaced side walls 40and 42 between which is located an ejection system 44 and a pair ofaprons 46 and 47, the latter of which serve to selectively open andclose the front and rear open ends of the scraper bowl. In this regard,it will be noted that each apron is power operated by a pair ofhydraulic cylinders 48 and 49 carried by the scraper bowl 22. Inaddition, front and rear cutting blades 50 and 52 are provided whichextend transversely between the side walls 40 and 42 and, in this case,constitute an integral part of the ejection system 44 which will beexplained in more detail hereinafter.

Each of the draft assemblies 24 and 26 includes a drawbar or supportframe 54 that extends outwardly from the scraper bowl 22 for pivotalconnection with a vertical king pin 56 rigidly mounted on the associateddrive unit. The support frame 54 is integrally formed with a pair ofdownwardly extending side sections 58 and 60, each of which supports anupper arm or link 62 and a lower arm or link 64. The longitudinal axesof the arms 62 and 64 are located in substantially parallel andhorizontally extending planes and, as best seen in FIG. 1, the upper arm62 has one end thereof pivotally connected to the side section 58 by apivotal connection 66, while the other end is connected to the scraperbowl by a pivotal connection 68 which also serves as a support for theassociated apron. Similarly, one end of the lower arm 64 is connected tothe side section 58 by a pivotal connection 70, while the other endofthe arm is connected to the scraper bowl 22 by a pivotal connection72. It will be understood that corresponding upper and lower arms areprovided along the opposite side of the scraper bowl and are connectedbetween the support frame and scraper bowl in a similar manner. Thus,the upper and lower arms on both sides of the scraper form aparallelogram 4-bar linkage which controls movement of the bowl betweena lowered-dig position and a raised-carry position. Movement of thescraper bowl 22 between these two positions is provided by verticallyorientated hydraulic bowl cylinders 74 and 76, each of which has thecylinder portion connected to the support frame 54, while the piston rodis pivotally connected to the scraper bowl 22. By directing fluid toeither of the bowl cylinders 74 or 76, selective control of the scraperbowl 22 is provided so that either one end or the other can be loweredinto a dig position depending upon the direction of travel of thescraper 10.

The ejection system employed by this scraper comprises a pair of flatplate sections 78 and 80 which extend transversely between the sidewalls 40 and 42 and are normally located in a horizontal plane, as shownin FIG. 1, so as to serve as a floor portion for retaining the materialwithin the scraper bowl 22. The adjacent or inner ends of the platesections are hinged together along a transverse axis by a pin 82, theopposite ends of which are respectively connected to the base ends ofhydraulic cylinders 84 and 86. The piston rod end of each hydrauliccylinder 84 and 86 is connected by a pivotal connection 88 to a raisedpart 90 of the scraper bowl. As seen in FIG. 2, a semi-cylindricalhousing 92 is connected to the base end of each hydraulic cylinder 84and 86 and is secured to a transversely extending wall 93 which servesto divide the scraper bowl 22 into two parts. The outer ends of theplate sections 78 and 80 are connected to the blades 50 and 52,respectively, and are adapted to be translated rearwardly under thecontrol of a pair of links 94 and 96, the adjacent ends of which arepivotally connected by a pin 98 to the scraper bowl 22, while theopposed ends are pivotally connected by pivot pins 100 and 102 tointermediate portions of the plate sections 78 and 80. Thus as seen inFIG. 3, when the hydraulic cylinders 84 and 86 are contracted, the platesections 78 and 80 as well as the wall 93 are raised in a verticaldirection causing the load within the scraper bowl 22 to be dropped bygravity. in order to facilitate discharging of the material, the aprons46 and 47 are placed in the raised position by expansion of thehydraulic cylinders 48 and 49.

From the above description, it should be apparent that the scraper canbe driven either forwardly or rearwardly during a scraping operation.Thus, assuming the scraper is moving in a cut toward the left as seen inFIG. 1, it can continue to load until the forward end of the scraperbowl 22 is completely loaded. Thereafter, the operator can operate bowlcylinders 74 and 76 to respectively raise cutting blade 50 and rearcutting blade 52 and have the scraper travel toward the right to loadthe opposite end of the scraper bowl until it reaches full capacity. Itshould be noted that in an instance where the scraper 10 is to becompletely turned around so that the operators cab 28 faces toward theright as seen in FIG. 1, the fact that both of the drive units 12 and 14are steerable about the associated king pin 56 permits the scraper 10 tonegotiate the full turnaround by following the paths illustrated in FIG.4. In this regard, initially the front and rear drive units 12 and 14will each be rotated about its steer axis, clockwise andcounterclockwise, respectively, so that the scraper 10 when drivenforwardly follows the curved path identified by the letter A. Theoperator will follow path A until the front steer axis of the scraperreaches the point D and the rear steer axis is located at point G.Thereafter, the front and rear drive units will be steered relative tothe scraper bowl 22 so that the scraper 10 can follow the curved path B.The scraper will then be driven along path B until the rear steer axisreaches point E and the front steer axis reaches point G. Once again,the front and rear drive units 12 and 14 will be steered relative to thescraper bowl 22 so that the scraper can follow a curved path C until thefront steer axis is located at point F and the rear steer axis at pointG. This simple maneuver permits the scraper 10 to completely reverse itsdirection in a minimum amount of space.

Various changes and modifications can be made in this constructionwithout departing from the spirit of the invention. Such changes andmodifications are contemplated by the inventor and he does not wish tobe limited except by the scope of the appended claims.

I claim:

1. An earthmoving scraper comprising a front frame unit and a rear frameunit, a material-handling bowl located between said front and rear frameunits, each of said frame units having driven wheels and carrying avertical king pin for supporting one end of the material-handling bowl,said bowl having an opening at both ends thereof for admitting materialinto the bowl when the scraper is driven in either direction along itslongitudinal axis and including a pair of laterally spaced side walls, apower-operated apron located between said side walls and adjacent eachopening in said bowl for opening and closing the opening, an ejectorsystem for discharging material from said bowl, said ejector systemcomprising a pair of axially aligned plate sections serving as ahorizontal floor for the material within the bowl, means interconnectingthe adjacent ends of the plate sections for relative pivotal movementabout a first horizontal axis, and a poweroperated cylinder connectedbetween a point on said bowl and said means for raising said adjacentends of the plate sections in a vertical direction, and link meanspivotally interconnecting an intermediate portion of each of said platesections to the bow] at a point vertically aligned with said horizontalaxis so during said raising ofsaid adjacent ends the free ends of theplate sections are translated rearwardly relative to the adjacent apronto allow the material to drop from the bowl 2. An earthmoving scrapercomprising a front frame unit and a rear frame unit, a material-handlingbowl located between said front and rear frame units, each of said frameunits having driven wheels and carrying a vertical king pin forsupporting one end of the material-handling bowl, said bowl having anopening at both ends thereof for admitting material into the bowl whenthe scraper is driven in either direction along its longitudinal axisand including a pair of laterally spaced side walls, an apron locatedbetween said side walls and adjacent each opening in said bowl foropening and closing the opening, an ejector system carried by said bowlfor discharging material therefrom, said ejector system comprising apair of plate sections normally located in a horizontal plane andserving as a floor for the material within the bowl, meansinterconnecting the adjacent ends of the plate sections for relativepivotal movement about a first horizontal axis, a pair of laterallyspaced and vertically orientated poweroperated cylinders, meanspivotally connecting each of said power-operated cylinders between apoint on said bowl and said first-mentioned means for raising the saidadjacent ends of the plate sections in a vertical direction while thefree ends of the plate sections are translated rearwardly relative tothe adjacent apron for dropping the material by gravity from the bowl,and a wall extending transversely to the longitudinal axis of thescraper for dividing the bowl and connected to said pair ofpower-operated cylinders for movement therewith in a vertical plane.

3. An earthmoving scraper comprising a front drive unit and a rear driveunit each of which is supported on an axle having driven wheels, amaterial-handling bowl located between said front and rear drive units,each of said drive units having a vertical king pin about which thedrive unit is steerable relative to the material-handling bowl, a draftassembly carried by the king pin of each of said drive units and servingto support one end of the material-handling bowl for selective movementbetween a lowered-dig position and a raised-carry position, said bowlhaving an opening at both ends thereof for admitting material in thebowl when the scraper is driven in either direction about itslongitudinal axis and including a pair of laterally spaced side walls, apower-operated apron located between said side walls and adjacent eachopening in said bowl for opening and closing said opening, an ejectorsystem carried by said bowl for discharging material therefrom, saidejector system comprising a pair of flat plate sections normally locatedin a horizontal plane and serving as a floor for the material within thebowl, means interconnecting the adjacent ends of the plate sections forrelative pivotal movement about a first horizontal axis, a pair oflaterally spaced and vertically oriented power-operated cylinders, meanspivotally connecttive to the adjacent apron to allow the material todrop from the bowl, and a wall extending transversely to thelongitudinal axis of the scraper for dividing the bowl and connected tosaid pair of power-operated cylinders for movement therewith in avertical plane.

1. An earthmoving scraper comprising a front frame unit and a rear frameunit, a material-handling bowl located between said front and rear frameunits, each of said frame units having driven wheels and carrying avertical king pin for supporting one end of the material-handling bowl,said bowl having an opening at both ends thereof for admitting materialinto the bowl when the scraper is driven in either direction along itslongitudinal axis and including a pair of laterally spaced side walls, apoweroperated apron located between said side walls and adjacent eachopening in said bowl for opening and closing the opening, an ejectorsystem for discharging material from said bowl, said ejector systemcomprising a pair of axially aligned plate sections serving as ahorizontal floor for the material within the bowl, means interconnectingthe adjacent ends of the plate sections for relative pivotal movementabout a first horizontal axis, and a power-operated cylinder connectedbetween a point on said bowl and said means for raising said adjacentends of the plate sections in a vertical direction, and link meanspivotally interconnecting an intermediate portion of each of said platesections to the bowl at a point vertically aligned with said horizontalaxis so during said raising of said adjacent ends the free ends of theplate sections are translated rearwardly relative to the adjacent apronto allow the material to drop from the bowl.
 2. An earthmoving scrapercomprising a front frame unit and a rear frame unit, a material-handlingbowl located between said front and rear frame units, each of said frameunits having driven wheels and carrying a vertical king pin forsupporting one end of the material-handling bowl, said bowl having anopening at both ends thereof for admitting material into the bowl whenthe scraper is driven in either direction along its longitudinal axisand including a pair of laTerally spaced side walls, an apron locatedbetween said side walls and adjacent each opening in said bowl foropening and closing the opening, an ejector system carried by said bowlfor discharging material therefrom, said ejector system comprising apair of plate sections normally located in a horizontal plane andserving as a floor for the material within the bowl, meansinterconnecting the adjacent ends of the plate sections for relativepivotal movement about a first horizontal axis, a pair of laterallyspaced and vertically orientated power-operated cylinders, meanspivotally connecting each of said power-operated cylinders between apoint on said bowl and said first-mentioned means for raising the saidadjacent ends of the plate sections in a vertical direction while thefree ends of the plate sections are translated rearwardly relative tothe adjacent apron for dropping the material by gravity from the bowl,and a wall extending transversely to the longitudinal axis of thescraper for dividing the bowl and connected to said pair ofpower-operated cylinders for movement therewith in a vertical plane. 3.An earthmoving scraper comprising a front drive unit and a rear driveunit each of which is supported on an axle having driven wheels, amaterial-handling bowl located between said front and rear drive units,each of said drive units having a vertical king pin about which thedrive unit is steerable relative to the material-handling bowl, a draftassembly carried by the king pin of each of said drive units and servingto support one end of the material-handling bowl for selective movementbetween a lowered-dig position and a raised-carry position, said bowlhaving an opening at both ends thereof for admitting material in thebowl when the scraper is driven in either direction about itslongitudinal axis and including a pair of laterally spaced side walls, apower-operated apron located between said side walls and adjacent eachopening in said bowl for opening and closing said opening, an ejectorsystem carried by said bowl for discharging material therefrom, saidejector system comprising a pair of flat plate sections normally locatedin a horizontal plane and serving as a floor for the material within thebowl, means interconnecting the adjacent ends of the plate sections forrelative pivotal movement about a first horizontal axis, a pair oflaterally spaced and vertically oriented power-operated cylinders, meanspivotally connecting each of said power-operated cylinders between apoint on said bowl and said first-mentioned means for raising the saidadjacent ends of the plate sections in a vertical direction, link meanspivotally interconnecting a portion of each of said plate sections tothe bowl at a point vertically aligned with said horizontal axis soduring said raising of said adjacent ends the free ends of the platesections are translated rearwardly relative to the adjacent apron toallow the material to drop from the bowl, and a wall extendingtransversely to the longitudinal axis of the scraper for dividing thebowl and connected to said pair of power-operated cylinders for movementtherewith in a vertical plane.